The city’s post–9-11 reality hit home last week with Prospect Heights co-op owners, who grumbled about the possible health effects of a city plan to install cellular phone equipment on their roof.

Engineers from Northrop Grumman Corporation presented the city plan for an “Emergency Communications System” to 25 residents of tony 50 Plaza Street East last Monday night — but were met with skepticism about whether the possible health risks of the cellular equipment are worth the $40 a month each family would receive.

“Forty dollars a month is not worth it,” said David Monico, a resident of the posh building. “For that amount of money, this is a waste of my time.”

The engineers from Northrop Grumman, which has a $500-million contract to install the communications equipment citywide, said there was no avoiding the antennas going up somewhere in Prospect Heights.

“There really is no alternative,” one engineer, John Moritz, explained.

Approximately 20 percent of the 400 antenna sites will be in Brooklyn.

Moritz disputed the assertion that cellphone equipment causes health problems, citing studies that have found no negative health effects. That said, Moritz confessed that Northrop Grumman “will not place the equipment on a public school.”

Reasonable discourse

We can provide a barrier to most things - electronic signals, radon, etc. Why can't a signal/radiation blocking barrier be installed between the antenna base and the structure supporting it ?

Has this even been considered by the City or Northrop Grumman ?

Nov. 7, 2007, 9:15 am

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